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world hot spots could distract
Washington from the Middle
East talks.
"They'll find themselves grap-
pling with serious problems in
East Asia, possibly in Eastern
Europe," he said. "Since Albright
and Clinton have very little abil-
ity to look beyond the crisis du
jour, I think they will not be able
to put the time into the Middle
East that they would otherwise
do."
Ironically, peace process sup-
porters fear the same distrac-
tions; the growing likelihood of
foreign policy emergencies in oth-
er parts of the world will make it
harder for Ms. Albright to use
her considerable clout to push Is-
raelis and Palestinians into a
tighter embrace, they say.
Domestic politics, too, could
limit the administration's
Mideast activism — unless
events in the region spin out of
control.
"My concern is that Albright
comes to foreign policy issues
with a very strong domestic po-
litical orientation," said Mr.
Quandt. "She's been very active
in political campaigns; at the
NSC, her focus was congres-
sional relations. I suspect that
she's going to have a strong in-
clination to think of what's po-
litically do-able, not about what
makes the most sense in terms
of American national interest."
But her management style of
leadership could be put to the
test if the peace process falls
apart, he said.
The appointment of Samuel
"Sandy" Berger to replace his
current boss, National Security
Adviser Tony Lake, also could
signal a decreasing focus on the
Middle East negotiations.
Mr. Berger, whose friendship
with Mr. Clinton goes back to the
1972 McGovern campaign, is re-
garded as a leading supporter of
Israel in the administration. Mr.
Berger is an active member of a

Conservative synagogue in the
Washington area, and a longtime
supporter of the Mideast peace
process.
But his foreign policy interests
have centered on other regions.
In an appearance on ABC's `This
Week" last month, he listed the
foreign policy priorities for the
second Clinton administration,
with Russia and Eastern Europe
at the top of the list — and the
Mideast talks somewhere near
the bottom.
"Sandy is staunchly pro-Israel,
but Mideast policy in this ad-
ministration is almost entirely
the purview of the White House
and-the State Department," said
an administration source. "He'll
have input, but his primary fo-
cus will be elsewhere."

"It's not impossible
Netanyahul will get
a diplomatic or
not-so-diplomatic
tongue-lashing from
[Albright]."

— Robert 0. Freedman

Mr. Cohen, the designated
Secretary of Defense and the
president's official nod to Cabi
net-level bipartisanship, will
come to the Pentagon with a long
record of strong support for Is-
rael, and for the special U.S.-Is-
raeli strategic relationship.
"His record in the Senate has
been good, and he's a known ex-
pert on ballistic missile defense,
which is very important from our
point of view,? said Tom Neu-
mann, executive director of the
Jewish Institute for National Se-
curity Affairs. "He's a real con-
sensus builder; given all that,
we're pretty happy with the ap-
pointment." O

Swiss Under Scrutiny
From Capitol Hill

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here were no startling rev-
elations in the recent
House Banking Commit-
tee hearings on the mush-
rooming controversy surrounding
Swiss bankers and their refusal
to account for money deposited
by Jews before the Holocaust.
What was important was the
high visibility of the session and
the accelerating Swiss effort at
damage control. The eight-hour
session drew an unusual num-
ber of members of Congress and
widespread media coverage.
Ambassador Thomas Borer,
head of an official Swiss inves-
tigation into the disputed funds,

argued that his government is
doing its best to account for the
money and respond to the grow-
ing clamor for restitution.
But Mr. Borer, who said he pre-
pared for the session by visiting
the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Mu-
seum, also said that it would take
up to three years to complete the
investigation, a claim many Jew-
ish leaders regard as one more de-
laying tactic after 50 years of
Swiss stonewalling.
In his testimony, Sen. Alfonse
D'Amato, R-N.Y., repeated
charges that the Swiss banks and
government "assisted and ad-
vanced the plundering of the fi-